The Hubris Of The Meteorically Arrived

Michael Hedges August 15, 2022 Follow on Twitter

Top executive compensation is always a subject of public interest. Big pay packages, complimented with eye-watering perks, are commonly viewed as excessive but just part of the game in the private sector. To fit in with the rich and famous, a chief executive must look the part. Boards of directors, themselves usually in that strata, understand this. After all, the primary roles of the chief executive are rubbing shoulders with investors and looking good at annual meetings. This is not exactly how it works in the public sector.

The general director of German regional public broadcaster Rundfunk Berlin-Brandenburg (RBB) - Patricia Schlesinger - resigned a week ago (August 7) from the position she had held since 2016. She also stepped down from the rotating directorship of public German national television network ARD. Allegations of financial improprieties, including nepotism and extravagance, had been beating like a drum for several weeks. She had been employed as a reporter and correspondent for different German public broadcasting organizations since 1990 before acceding to managerial roles. Officially, Frau Schlesinger in “on leave” as the administrative board determines contract outcomes in the coming week.

Public broadcaster Rundfunk Berlin-Brandenburg (RBB) has served two German Federal States - Berlin and Brandenburg - since 2002 from studio and office complexes primarily in Berlin and Potsdam, respectively. RBB, stylized as rbb, is a product of German reunification. RBB Fernsehen is its dedicated television channel, complimented by participations in ARD channel Das Erste, ARD/ZDF news and public affairs channel Phoenix, ARD/ZDF children’s channel Ki.Ka, European cultural channel Arte and the 3sat joint venture with German-language public broadcasters. On the radio side, RBB operates national channels Radioeins and Fritz, Berlin channels RBB 88.8, rbbKultur and rbb24 Inforadio news channel and well as Potsdam channel Antenne Brandenburg. All are distributed through FM and various digital platforms.

Initial reporting on a questionable consulting contract between Gerhard Spörl, Frau Schlesinger’s husband, and trade show organizer Messe Berlin, whose chief executive is Wolf-Dieter Wolf, also RBB board chairperson, came from Business Insider (June 25), principally owned by publisher Axel Springer, editorially right-wing and long critical of German public broadcasting. Business Insider has published a German edition for several years. Since that first report, Business Insider has published nearly a dozen scathing articles about Frau Schlesinger and RBB. In the midst, Herr Wolf also resigned from the RBB board of directors.

It is no coincidence that the Business Insider reports came as the public broadcasting system and the German Federal States are renegotiating budgets and the mandated household license fee. The alleged profligate spending at the executive level - office renovations, expensed dinners at her home as well as a luxury Audi 8 automobile plus two chauffeurs - also gained resonance as RBB budgets are being cut. The revelations of Frau Schlesinger’s missteps have been fodder for right-wing politicians, seeking to install like-minded media executives where ever possible. Other German media outlets, including Der Spiegel and public broadcaster NDR, rushed to report more alleged transgressions.

Support for Frau Schlesinger ranges from scant to non-existent. It appears that RBB employees - including journalists - are telling anybody how they feel, sometimes what they know. The usually direct but diplomatic German Journalists’ Association (DJV) chairperson Frank Überall took to Der Tagesspiegel (August 14) to call for her immediate removal, citing “new details from their presumably luxurious activities at the expense of contributors and ultimately also on the back of employees and the program are constantly being published." The RBB Broadcasting Council (Rundfunkrat) is set to meet Monday (August 15) to “discuss” terminating Frau Schlesinger’s contract, due to expire next February.

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